Australia zoo

Tuesday, November 11th

Remembrance day.  On 11/11 at 11am, there is a moment of silence to remember Australian soldiers of the past.

We started our morning again at 6:30am. Our bus departed the station at 7:45am and we arrived at the Australian Zoo at 9:30am.  I got told off twice that morning.  My booking ticket, which is different from my actual bookings since I changed my schedule since we printed our tickets, was in my wall-e.  I didn't think I needed it to get on the bus since I had my booking number and an ID.  Nope, the driver needed the ticket so he can check off my name.  So annoying.  I had to dig through my bag to get it.

After I got on the bus, I got told off by an old lady sitting next to me.  We got assigned seats even though the bus was pretty much empty.  She warned me I shouldn't have brought on the hash brown Bernice bought us for breakfast because no hot food is allowed on the bus.  She explained to me why as I'm shoving down the hash brown.  I was not going to sit on a long bus ride with no food since I do get motion sickness.

The ride to the zoo was easy, I took the time to finish up my blog.  The poor lady wanted to talk to me, but I just wasn't that interested at all, so the conversations eventually died down.

At 9:30am we arrived at the zoo.  Andy, a Vietnamese-Irish guy, greeted us and asked if he could join us.  Sure why not, always happy to make new friends.  It was interesting to hear an Asian person with an Irish accent, sort of sounded like my Scottish friend Paul.  He didn't like that comment at all.  Andy said the Irish accent is very different from Scottish.  Oh wells.

He followed us three girls around.  We first locked our bags in lockers before exploring the Australia zoo (www.australiazoo.com), which costs aud47 to get in with yha card.

Australia zoo is also known by many as Steve Irwin's zoo.  If you recall, Steve Irwin died in 2006 after being stabbed in the heart by the barb of a two-meter bull ray while swimming near batt reef on a filming trip in far north Queensland.  It has been classified as a freak attack since bull rays are a non-aggressive species and stingray wounds are rare enough.  Death by stingray is almost unknown.

The zoo is still operates under Steve Irwin's tradition of exuberant exhibitionism.  Some animals we saw were:

Koalas - they were sitting on macadamia trees, since they don't grow as tall, so we can see them high up on the tree.  The zoo keepers feed them eucalyptus everyday.  They were everywhere sleeping on top of trees curled up into a fur ball.  Very cute, so cute we couldn't resist to not hold one.

We paid AUD17 ($12) to take a photo with it.  His name was Jafer, like the aussie lollie (aka candy), and he was 5 years old.  His fur was really soft and he just hugged us.  So cute!  He did stink and after holding him for 5 seconds our clothes smelled like him.  Stinky eucalyptus.  Totally worth it.

Kookaburra birds - the largest kingfisher and actually laughs.  To eat it's food, it bashes it with it's strong beak, and then flick it in the air to swallow it.

Komodo dragons - the largest lizard in the world.

Otters - they have two layers of fur.  Top coat is brown and waxy, so the water just glides off of it.  The second coat is soft and white.

Elephants - we saw plenty in Thailand so were not so excited about them.

Native turtles - big land turtles with stumpy feet.  The oldest turtle found was a few hundred years old, unlike what the Chinese claim that they live to be thousands of years old.  Can't ever trust the Chinese.

Salt water crocodiles - more aggressive than american alligators with smaller heads.  Move best in water.

Dingoes - looks like a cross between a dog and a fox.  Natives used to have them as pets.  We are going to see plenty in australia.  They're one of the few pure breds.

Macaws - all different colors.  They can live up to 70-80yrs, but have a mentality of a 5yr old.  Endangered because people are capturing them as pets.

Common wombat - so cute and awkward.  Looks like a giant blob of fur.  Bernice's favorite

Red kangaroos and grey kangaroos heaven - they almost look the same, except slight difference in the fur colors.  They were around 3-4ft tall.  We actually pet them and could feed them.  Their fur is very soft.  It actually uses it's tail to balance and walk like a cane.  We didn't get to see the Kickboxing kangaroos; they are huge could easily hop over any fence.

Wallabies - like a small kangaroo, but much cuter.  We also got to pet them.  Fuzzy wuzzy!

Tigers - they called the area tiger temple, which to us have bad connotations since the tiger temple in thailand is known for abusing and drugging their tigers.  They were playing with the trainers like the tigers at tiger kingdom in thailand.

Echidna - australian porcupine.  Very cute and walks funny.  It also has a long duck like beak.  By the echidna, we saw a turkey looking bird kicking the leaves in the road, looked like it was trying to build a nest.

Shingleback - a lizard thing that looks like it has two heads since the tail is shaped as its head.  This is a defense mechanism to confuse would-be predators.

Tazmanian devils - they don't look like dizzy or taz on wb, but bernice said they make the same types of noise.  Their foot markings are unique to each individual.  Like a cat, its tail position indicates their mood.  When they are agitated, alarmed or frightened, their tails perk up..

Cheetah - they have a few cheetahs in the zoo that they walk everyday.  We learned the cheetah encounter in Speir winery at Stellenbosch was legitimate.  Australian zoo actually donates a lot of money there each year.

At 3pm, we went to get our bags and waited for our shuttle.  Our ride was pretty long, from 3pm to 8:30pm, with a 40min dinner break.  The driver reminded me of Fred Meiser with curly hair and goofy mannerisms.  His driving was horrendous, constantly jerking.  We were sitting in the back at first, not because that's what cool kids did, but because all the seats up front were taken.  When people left for Noosa, including Andy, I moved to a seat upfront.  This dude was just a bad driver.  The car was jerking in a straight away!

Our dinner stop wasn't that eventful and the food was pretty bad.  Steph had nuggets that tasted like over grind meat with soggy fries, Bernice had hamburger that didn't taste like meat, and I had a chicken wrap that was ok because the chicken was hidden by the lettuce and carrots.  We also had a dutch girl sit with us.  She had been traveling that day since 6am to get to Hervey Bay.  Long bus day for her.  She asked us where we were from and when we said America, she was pretty shocked by our skin color.  I guess where she lived there isn't much diversity.  After dinner the driver put on the movie wild hogs.  It wasn't good, but entertaining.  I watched it in the background as I was trying to finish my catfish and mandala book.

At 8:30pm, we got picked up by our shuttle to go to koala beach resort in Hervey Bay.  Our driver was a bit quirky with a lot of jokes.  I had to pee really badly when I got off the greyhound, so I asked him how far is the hostel because I need to use the toilet.  He didn't get my question, either because I was mumbling or my accent, but he answered anyways.  He told us how far things were in relations to our hostel.  I just held it until we got to the hostel.  He helped lightened our moods from the bus ride.

At koala hostel we had a room to ourselves, and it was only AUD16.50 ($11) since we got a voucher for it when we booked our tours.  The place was also very clean and was right next to the beach.  I would totally stay there again.

Before bedtime, we organized our stuff for fraser island.  Everything needed to fit in one small bag.  Oh my.  I also discovered I left my new toothbrush with my travel container at Brisbane!  Thank goodness Bernice had an extra one.  At 10:30ish we started to lay down.  I tried to finish up my book, but wasn't that successful at it.  I have about 25 more pages to go.